The program is easy to use.
The program is straightforward and simple to use. that it is only by speaking that our partners can be expected to understand us we can start to forgive them for not being mind readers and then our relationships can start to be more about mutual understanding and less about making up for the disappointment of a missed telepathic connection
We don’t officially believe in mind reading and scoff at the idea that we can know what number between one and a million a stranger is thinking of, or that we can place our hands on someone else’s skull and Intuit the details of their dream. However, in relationships, whatever our professed skepticism, we often act as if mind reading were possible and a standard requirement in love. We can become bitter and surprised when our partner doesn’t know what we are thinking without us needing to speak. We might get huffy that they didn’t realize our off-color comment was only a joke, or we can’t understand why they like a book we’ve already decided is silly. We get worked up that they didn’t know we wouldn’t want to go to the mountains this summer, or that they can’t understand our mood when we get back from having lunch with our mother. We can’t conceive that certain ideas and feelings that are so vivid in our minds should not be obvious to our partner.
Our superstitious commitment to mind reading soon evolves into something darker as relationships proceed. We quickly fall into believing that our partner’s incomprehension can only be explained as willful or nasty and therefore it seems only fair that we respond with one of our standard forms of punishment.
As children, our parents seemed to know what we were thinking without us needing to speak, as if by magic. They guessed we might want some milk, determined we needed a bath or a nap, or noticed a blanket was scratchy for our cheek. From this, an equation formed in our minds that whenever we are properly loved, we do not need to explain.
However, our parents had a huge advantage over our partners as we were then much simpler. We had no advanced views on politics, complicated opinions on interior design, or faint tremors of sarcasm or hypocrisy. We are now adults with complex requirements and feelings, and our partner’s inability to know all this fast and decisively can feel like an intimate insult.
Once we accept that it is only by speaking that our partners can be expected to understand us, we can start to forgive them for not being mind readers and our relationships can start to be more about mutual understanding and less about making up for the disappointment of a missed telepathic connection.